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Basic Social Skills Guide

improveyoursocialskills.com

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Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#151

Post by sundarurfriend »

_9ptr wrote: post #94
sundarurfriend wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've found that no mater what country I've been to, or what social classes the people belong to, three topics have a 95% success rate when it comes to social relations with guys: sports, cars, fishing/hunting. And to some degree handywork. Have you generally been to the Americas and Western Europe? Sports is the one universal, that makes sense in my experience too. But most people outside the rich upper class don't…

What do Asians talk about then?

Talking about the variety of facilities the region has, about traffic, new constructions - anything development related is guaranteed to get the conversation going. There's a lot of rapid urbanization and change going on, and people always have something they want to get off their chest about it.

If you don't mind a bit of griping, politics is not a bad shout either. People aren't hardline attached to one side or the other as much here, and even when they are, they're much more willing to admit corruption at a local city level even if their favourite party is in charge. Complaining about corruption is a common pastime.

Movies and music are also pretty good generic options, as are motorbikes or electric scooters with younger guys in their early-mid twenties.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#152

Post by cindyllm »

foxglacier wrote: post #53
guerrilla wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this AI spam or psychosis? I don't understand.

3rd option is you just don't understand. This is language people use to describe narcissists. Flying monkeys are people who help them manipulate others and vampires are "emotional vampires". Poster was saying a narcissist had died, leaving their support people leaderless.

[dead]

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#153

Post by GiorgioG »

sokoloff wrote: post #118
GiorgioG wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not ok. Be an adult and deal with the emotional discomfort to pay your last respects.

It’s absolutely okay to prioritize the needs and comfort of the living. The guest of honor won’t notice, I promise. If the other (living) attendees have a problem with it, it’s at least 51% a them problem, IMO.

This take is sad. We have become a society of emotionally weak people.

My wife and I make our kids do uncomfortable things because that’s what separates children from adults. An example, and not even the hardest one: Yesterday we were vacationing at the beach and we got a call from the dog boarding facility keeping our 8 year old dog, she was having seizures and had to be taken to an animal hospital. We drove 3 hours to see her. There was lots of crying, in front of everyone - who gives a shit. We had to have her euthanized. The 4 of us stayed with her for the entire process. We could have just told them to put her down over the phone and continued our vacation, or we could have left the room as they ended her life. She wasn’t conscious and we have no way of knowing if she was aware of our presence, but if something/someone makes an impact on your life, learn to be a little unselfish and be present. It hurts, but just because something hurts doesn’t mean we should shy away from doing it.

Learning to steel yourself is an important life skill. Obviously a dog is not a human, but the parallels are there - as humans we have honored the end of a impactful life throughout our history.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#154

Post by piltdownman »

solardev wrote: post #124
jeltz wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have the same experience at all. The people who I know and have met which enjoy watching sports come at all levels of fitness. I am not that interested myself but quite many of the members of my running club enjoy watching sports and some of them can run 3 hour marathons. And if you have ever met football ultras most of them are very fit.

What are football ultras?

Somewhere between dedicated fans of (often working class) European Football teams and paramilitary organisations. Green Street starring Elijah Wood is a film accessible to overseas audiences detailing the cultural phenomenon n the UK.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultras

In Europe however, Italy in particular, organised crime is embedded in the structure - e.g. Gennaro Di Tommaso aka "The C0rpse", the leader of Napoli's ultras whose approval is needed before a match can take place

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/curva-nostra-mob-infilt...

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#155

Post by BaseBaal »

solardev wrote: post #124
jeltz wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't have the same experience at all. The people who I know and have met which enjoy watching sports come at all levels of fitness. I am not that interested myself but quite many of the members of my running club enjoy watching sports and some of them can run 3 hour marathons. And if you have ever met football ultras most of them are very fit.

What are football ultras?

Extremely fanatic soccer "fans", aka hooligans. Basically just an excuse to be antisocial.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#156

Post by Thorrez »

solardev wrote: post #141
TrackerFF wrote: post #20

I've found that no mater what country I've been to, or what social classes the people belong to, three topics have a 95% success rate when it comes to social relations with guys: sports, cars, fishing/hunting. And to some degree handywork. It is a bit unfortunate, as I'm not at all interested in talking about those things - but they are such staple topics, that you can come off as a sort of outcast if you can't keep…

Wow, you've had a very different experience, and apparently met very different people (or at least saw different sides of them). I have never discussed those things with my friends or acquaintances anywhere in the world, across many countries... I don't know anything (or care about) any of them, so I suppose I self-select out of those groups. The people I end up bonding with (all over the world) are usually because o…

Hunting/fishing are one type of "outdoor stuff".

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#157

Post by Thorrez »

ffin wrote: post #115
arethuza wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Going/been anywhere nice recently" is a pretty good one in the UK - most people have some kind of holiday and I don't follow football and my interest in cars is probably limited to my occasional bouts of incandescent rage at people not signalling correctly on roundabouts...

In the US I was taught you don’t need to signal at roundabouts. Am I doing something terribly wrong?

>Signal when you change lanes or exit the roundabout.

California Driver Handbook

https://www.dmv.ca.gov/web/eng_pdf/dl600.pdf

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#158

Post by notahacker »

jeltz wrote: post #106
oblio wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even in Western Europe. Hunting is extremely rare (and generally an indicator of old money or living in an extremely rural environment). Fishing is a lot more popular but even that tends to date you a bit. At least for Eastern Europe, fishing is a lot more popular among the 45+ year olds. OP is primarily speaking about a North American perspective, I think.

Even here in Sweden a lot of the people fishing are older Polish immigrants unless you live in s rural area.

Seems to be quite popular with younger Polish immigrants in the UK. Although a key point of difference which might make it difficult to find common ground with British anglers is they often seem to regard cooking and eating the fish (rather than throwing it back) and important part of the exercise. More likely to find agreement if they stick to slagging off the UK government ;-)

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#159

Post by sebastianconcpt »

TheCapeGreek wrote: post #62
rsaarelm wrote: post #31

Mask every day. Life goal: Be 100% artificial person. All openings and responses must be calculated and faked. Your inner self is faulty and not appropriate at any situation. Once you train and work hard enough to suppress it at all times forever, you may be accepted and allowed to participate.

Fake it till you make it. "Be yourself" is not wrong, but it's not specific enough. You can be perfectly authentic, but that doesn't mean being socially uncalibrated. Get good at being sociable, then blend that with your personal tastes and preferences. I thought "be yourself" was fine until I grew up and learned I was just being rude to most people and called myself introverted when I didn't make friends.

"Be yourself" works when you're awesome already (and keep performing).

So it's not useful advice for most that need to build yourself up to something that performs decently, nicely or awesomely (the most you can).

And Fake it till you make it is an awful expression (encourages posing and faking is legitimate when is not by definition) to communicate that you just need practice to obtain a level of performance.

Re: Basic Social Skills Guide

#160

Post by apexalpha »

GiorgioG wrote: post #149
brulard wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the worst advice someone could give. It absolutely is ok to decide on your own if it's good for you and the others if you attend or not. I wouldn't want anyone to come to my funeral just because others expect him to.

Someone should attend your funeral because they made some kind of connection with you in this short life. Being uncomfortable for 30 minutes is the least one can do. I am so tired of people being so emotionally immature that they can’t handle a little discomfort.

Seconded, the person you initially respond to is the target audience of this website, and would probably do well to take it in.

A funeral is not 'some event' that you can just skip for your own benefit. That's not what it's about.

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